Stephanopoulos Combats Ann Coulter on Historical Events In Her New Book

ABC's George Stephanopoulos went beyond challenging assumptions from
Ann Coulter's newest book "Demonic: How the Liberal Mob Is Endangering
America" on Tuesday, as he repeatedly attempted to correct her on
historical facts. The former Clinton advisor interrupted her multiple
times on Tuesday's Good Morning America to make a point that she was
either wrong or lying about history.

You are entitled to your own opinion, but not your own facts, said the
late Democrat Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Yet Stephanopoulos
interrupted Coulter as she claimed that the Ku Klux Klan in the South
was Democratic. "Started out Democratic, but turned very quickly,"
Stephanopoulos asserted.

That depends on the meaning of "quick." The Ku Klux Klan advocated
anti-Republican violence in the post-Civil War years, and its resurgence
in the early 20th century was due to Democrats; in fact, the Klan had
quite a large voice at the 1924 Democratic National Convention. The
Southern Klan had strong ties to the Democratic Party, and the South was
heavily Democratic into the 1960s.

Coulter replied that the Klan never turned Republican and
Stephanopoulos abruptly changed the subject. He then hit Coulter for
alleging that the Civil Rights movement was an unruly mob while
defending violence for the pro-life cause. Coulter corrected him, saying
that she was comparing the two groups and not defending violence.

Coulter later profiled civil rights icons Martin Luther King and
Thurgood Marshall as at odds over the methods they used to achieve civil
rights for African-Americans. Marshall made legal arguments and won
court cases while King led street protests.

Stephanopoulos retorted the two figures "would see themselves as
allies." Coulter replied "They did not," before backing up her claim by
citing a letter where Marshall criticized King.

A transcript of the segment, which aired on June 7 at 8:15 a.m. EDT, is as follows:

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: So much to talk about this morning with the
always-provocative Ann Coulter. She's had seven best-sellers, never
shies away from a hot debate. And you can tell from the title of her new
book "Demonic: How the Liberal Mob is Endangering America" that she's
ready for a few more debates. And Ann, welcome. I want to get to the
book in just a second, but we've got to begin with Congressman Anthony
Weiner. You almost predicted it last week.

ANN COULTER: Yes I did. Thank you for noticing that. In fact, he used
almost the same terms in his press conference yesterday as I did in my
column. He Twittered this by mistake, he thought it was a private tweet,
sent it to his whole list, panicked, and claimed he had been hacked.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Now I think we might be able to agree on at least one thing, that sex scandals know no party.

COULTER: (Laughing) No that's true, but I would say, consistent with
the theme of my book "the liberals behave like a mob," that
conservatives respond to their sex scandals differently because we don't
elevate our leaders. There isn't a sort of messiah worship, a mob
characteristic. We're worried about being consistent. We aren't
comfortable with contradictory thinking. The only Republican sex scandal
where the Republican didn't resign or not run for re-election is Vitter
down in Louisiana, and that was -

STEPHANOPOULOS: After soliciting prostitutes -

COULTER: - but that was seven years earlier. By the time it broke he
had - he had apologized to his wife. It was over. It came out when the
D.C. Madame releases her list. And by the way, everybody knew there were
Democrats on that list.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Mark Sanford, governor of South Carolina, held on as well for a long time.

COULTER: Well a brief time, but the basic Republican response is not to
attack the person who just releases information. And by the way,
congratulations to ABC - you guys owned the Weiner story, you did all of
the reporting. But the way - I mean, all the reporting on this last
week was to attack Andrew Breitbart, attack some random hacker - I don't
know who broke the Mark Foley story. I don't know who broke -

STEPHANOPOULOS: Actually ABC was on top of that one as well.

COULTER: And by the way, we were upset about that, because I believe
you guys - that's the only one where I remember the source at all, and
the claim was that ABC had it but they held it until the day after Foley
couldn't be replaced.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Oh, that's not true. Anyway, let's get to the book,
"Demonic: How the Liberal Mob Is Endangering America." You write, and
this - I think this is a fair quote to pull from the book. You say
basically "Republicans are the party of peaceful order; Democrats are
the party of noisy, violent mobs." And you say it's rooted in the
Democrats following the French Revolution, Republicans following the
American Revolution. Explain that.

COULTER: Yes. Well, the first part is sort of a psychological profile
of the Left. So even liberals who are wondering why they behave the way
they behave might want to read it, because it explains it, and it's all
mob psychology from this French psychologist - or social psychologist,
Gustave Le Bon, who is the father of group-think, and Hitler and
Mussolini studied him to learn how to incite mobs. And as I was reading a
lot of books on mobs and group-think, I mean everything just describes
the behavioral patterns of the Left. And then the middle section, I go
through the American tradition, which is to write arguments like the
Declaration of Independence - that's what we celebrate, what the do the
French celebrate? Bastille Day, where a bunch of lunatics stormed an
empty prison, because they thought it was unsightly and it was based on
rumors. And if you look at the history of the Left in this country -
including the Klan in the South, which was Democratic, contrary to
revisionist history -

STEPHANOPOULOS: Started out Democratic, but turned very quickly.

COULTER: Not to Republican. It was never Republican.

STEPHANOPOULOS: You take on the Civil Rights movement, and that's where
it seems that you fall into some contradictions. You seem to suggest
that that is part of the mob, yet this was a peaceful mob almost
entirely, yet you seem to express some kind of understanding for
anti-abortion protesters who use violence.

COULTER: No, no, no, no, no, I'm comparing the two, actually. I think
they're very similar. And the reason I raise the Civil Rights movement
is that gave mobs a halo, because that was the first time mobs were
being deployed -

STEPHANOPOULOS: Because it was peaceful. It was civil disobedience.

COULTER: No, it was - the cause behind it. Up until then, from the
beginning of the Revolution to the Shay's Rebellion to the draft riots
here in New York City by Democrats lynching blacks, it was always - the
Left, it was Democrats, it was the SDS, the Weathermen, mobs have always
been a bad thing. The Civil Rights movement was the first time in this
country it started to give street protests - I mean not all street
protests are going to be a mob, but my point on this - well, two
different things. One is comparing Martin Luther King to Thurgood
Marshall who, sort of surprising to me, became a hero of this book
because when I was in law school he was just signing on to all of the
opinions with Justice Brennan, I just thought of him as a liberal. But
his history - I mean, it is the tradition of the American Revolution.
He's making arguments, he's bringing court cases, he is winning them. In
1954 he won Brown v. Board of Education. If there had been Republican
presidents for that eight years, nine years, from '60-'68, you never
would have had the Civil Rights movement.

STEPHANOPOULOS: I wish we had more time. I think Marshall and King would see themselves as allies -

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